Dark Horse Penguin Picks: March 2024
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
Captain Momo’s Secret Base vol. 1
Dark Horse has been committed – COMMITTED, I say – to making mangaka Kenji Tsuruta a name to remember in the North American manga market. I say this because this is the third series of his that they’re publishing after “Wandering Island” and “Emanon.” It bears mentioning that only two volumes of “Wandering Isle” have seen print in Japan and America, despite the series having been serialized for the better part of a decade. There’s also no sign of a new volume of “Emanon” even though its fourth volume ended in a way that didn’t wrap things up for anyone. I guess the hope with this title is that the third time’s the charm?
It could be. Unlike those other series, the solicitation for “Captain Momo’s Secret Base” doesn’t promise anything other than the story of a slacker with a cat… IN SPAAAAAAAACE! That’s right. No secret islands to be found. No people with the collective memory of humanity to be concerned with. The title character is stuck on a cargo ship where her biggest struggle is against tedium and conforming to the company dress code. It could add up to nothing, or it might wind up being the first series the publisher has released from Tsuruta that’s charming without reservation.
Usagi Yojimbo: Crow #1 (of 5): Fun fact: Dark Horse is including the legacy issue numbers for “Usagi” with this latest miniseries – of which this is issue #275. The story for this one has Usagi and Yukichi rescuing a merchant from bandits, only to find out that he’s actually a criminal with a price on his head. Of course, whenever there’s a major bounty to be had in this series, you can bet that Gen and Stray Dog won’t be too far behind to collect on it. While this implies that Usagi and Yukichi will come into conflict with those bounty hunters over this criminal’s fate, I’m curious as to how this conflict will play out. Are the Rabbit Ronin going to feel honor bound to protect this guy after they saved his life, or has this guy been sincerely trying to turn over a new leaf and they both respect that? I’m asking because I’m curious, not because I don’t think creator Stan Sakai hasn’t thought this through. I’ll just have to wait until this gets a collected edition to get my answers.
Minor Threats: The Fastest Way Down #1 (of 4?): Co-writers Patton Oswalt and Jordan Blum and artist Scott Hepburn’s miniseries gets a proper follow-up after the spinoff “The Alternates.” I haven’t read the original miniseries yet because it has yet to be offered at a decent discount on Amazon, or come back in stock again at CheapGraphicNovels.com. One of these days though, and hopefully by the time I’ve forgotten what’s in the solicitation text for this issue. I can’t say for sure, but it feels like it’s spoiling what happened at the end of that miniseries, with some significant deaths and a character ascending to the throne of supervillainy in Redport. However, now that they’re king, everyone else in the city wants a shot at them. Sounds like a good setup, and something that I could look forward to after I finally read the first volume.
Monsters Are My Business #1: Writer Cullen Bunn has made his name writing a lot of horror comics over the years. Yet none of them could ever be properly described as “horror comedies” until now. Meet Tanner “Griz” Grisholm who wages a war against nightmares alongside a vindictive necromancer and a chainsaw-wielding koala bear named Cuddles. They’re willing to take on anything, except that this latest mission is personal as it involves Griz’s old biker pals who are up to no good. I’ve found the majority of Bunn’s work over the years to be resolutely fine – perfectly readable yet never quite good enough to make me want to pick up a project of his based on his name alone. Horror-comedy is a new avenue for him, and I do like the idea of one character being a chainsaw-wielding koala bear, so… we’ll see how this goes.
Operation Sunshine: Already Dead #1 (of ??): “Last Podcast on the Left” hosts Henry Zebrowski and Marcus Parkes’ miniseries about vampire kids trying to steal an artifact to turn themselves human again gets another go. Wherein the “Operation Sunshine” is still ongoing and has them infiltrating a vampire party in Louisiana to put their plan further into motion. While it’s a good sign that this title is getting a second miniseries, the fact that the main story is still ongoing implies that first volume tells an incomplete story. Will that be the case here, and is “Operation Sunshine” really a secret 12-issue maxiseries? Inquiring minds want to know, but are also happy to see that David Rubin is still illustrating this miniseries.
Dudley Datson #1: Here’s another series that comes to us as a result of Scott Snyder’s publishing deal with (the late) ComiXology. This one involves the title character, a fifteen-year-old with a penchant for invention, his dog, and a machine that allows them to travel anywhere in time and space. Oh, and have you ever wondered why great figures in history all had pet companions, and if they were all running from the same thing? And who are the dastardly foes that are threatening to turn Dudley’s life upside down? This sounds like an incoherent grab-bag of ideas that makes me wonder if Snyder was literally spitballing ideas for artist Jamal Igle to draw. Or the solicitation could just be written badly (I hope). Regardless, I don’t feel like there’s anything here to convince me to pick up another creator-owned title from Snyder after being burned by the last few that I’ve read.
Empowered vol. 12: Making its third appearance in these solicitations. Which, at this point, one has to wonder if something has gone wrong behind the scenes. It could be clashes between creator Adam Warren and Dark Horse editorial, which would be bad. Or Warren could be going through some kind of personal or familial crisis, which would be worse. Whatever the case is, I hope that Warren is doing well and that we’ll get to read this volume at some point in 2024.
Grendel Omnibus vol. 5: Collecting the first round of “Grendel Tales” miniseries that explored the world of Grendel in the post-Orion Assante era. These stories represented the first time that creator Matt Wagner let writers other than himself into this world that he created. I’ve got some of the stories collected here on my shelf, and it’ll be good to give them a re-read in this new edition. Mainly because I can’t remember if they were any good or not.
Mob Psycho 100 vol. 14: I was under the impression that the series reached its climax with the fight against the President of Claw in vol. 12. Yet the story described here makes it sound like mangaka ONE is going to keep finding new and interesting stories to tell about the title character until the series wraps up with vol. 16. I say this because not only are we dealing with a Divine Tree that has sprung up to control Seasoning City with a strange mannequin of Mob at its head, but the adherents of Psychohelmetism are brainwashing everyone in the city in the name of their savior – Mob himself. This doesn’t seem like an arc that’s going to wind down the action before the end and more power to ONE if his plan is to send the series out firing on all cylinders.